Problem 1.

44 [Difficulty: 2]

Given: Mass flow rate of water determine by collecting discharge over a timed interval is 0.2 kg/s.

Scales can be read to nearest 0.05 kg.

Stopwatch can be read to nearest 0.2 s.

Find: Estimate precision of flow rate calculation for time intervals of (a) 10 s, and (b) 1 min.

Solution: Apply methodology of uncertainty analysis, Appendix F:

∆m
m& =
∆t
Computing equations: 1
⎡⎛ ∆m ∂m& ⎞ ⎛ ∆t ∂m&
2
⎞ ⎤2
2

u m& = ± ⎢⎜ u ∆m ⎟ + ⎜ u ∆t ⎟ ⎥
⎣⎢⎝ m& ∂∆m ⎠ ⎝ m& ∂∆t ⎠ ⎦⎥

∆m ∂m& 1 ∆t ∂m& ∆t 2 ∆m
Thus = ∆t = 1 and = ⋅ − 2 = −1
m& ∂∆m ∆t m& ∂∆t ∆m ∆t
The uncertainties are expected to be ± half the least counts of the measuring instruments.

Tabulating results:

Water
Time Uncertainty Uncertainty Uncertainty
Error in ∆t Collected, Error in ∆m
Interval, ∆t in ∆t in ∆m &
in m
(s) ∆m (kg)
(s) (%) (%) (%)
(kg)

10 ± 0.10 ± 1.0 2.0 ± 0.025 ± 1.25 ± 1.60

60 ± 0.10 ± 0.167 12.0 ± 0.025 ± 0.208 ± 0.267

A time interval of about 15 seconds should be chosen to reduce the uncertainty in results to ± 1 percent.